This article provides an overview of the situation of Spanish in the Irish educational system and in wider society. Spain enjoys positive attitudes among Irish people, helped by the considerable amount of property in that country purchased by Irish during the past few years. The Spanish language has over the years experienced mixed fortunes as regards its place in Irish education. Recently, however, there has been a moderate increase in the numbers studying Spanish across all sectors. Other European languages have lost students, while uptake for Spanish has increased. Numbers studying Spanish lag far behind those studying French, however, and in fact there is a general tendency towards a decrease in the study of languages nationally. The future is problematic, since any weakening of the requirement that those seeking admission to the National University of Ireland must have studied foreign languages will tend to detract from their status. Another factor that is very hard to predict is the effect of mass immigration - there are now over 100 languages spoken in Ireland - on linguistic policy.